


Asgard: A History--or, to you Uneducated Mortals, The Crash Course In Everything You Always Get Wrong About Everything In Asgard

by Red Dragon (Red_Dragonn)



Category: Norse Religion & Lore, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies), Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Ancient History, Loki Writes A Book, Loki is Not Amused, Marvel Norse Lore, Marvel Universe, Multi, Odin Committed Fratricide, Odin Is A Mass Murderer, References to Norse Religion & Lore, The Aesir Fight The Vanir, They All Suck, They Tried To Burn Freya Alive, They suck, abandoned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-26
Updated: 2016-08-27
Packaged: 2018-07-26 19:25:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7586848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Red_Dragonn/pseuds/Red%20Dragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's all because of a cow.</p><p>ABANDONED AS OF 12/23/2017</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Creationism

It has come to my attention that you humans have a…the only accurate word is ‘strange’…concept of Asgard’s (and our pantheon’s) histories. Mind you, I’m no ancient foe from the beginning of the Universe, so some of this is really just hearsay. Like this story here. Yet I think you may wish to hear it.

The beginning of the universe as we know it was basically a giant hole; one side had fire on it and one was ice. Supposedly these were Nidavellir and Muspellheim, but I have my doubts, and you are welcome to your own. 

Basically the ice from ‘Nidavellir’ and the fires of this ‘Muspellheim’ managed to melt into the abyss, creating a god called Ymir.  
I find this to be exceedingly unlikely, but Odin and his insist it is true. 

Ymir was still being burned by fire, so he naturally had to perspire; should the legend hold true, the Jotnar were formed out of Ymir-sweat. And the ice continued to melt.

That made, even more unlikely, a gigantic cow. This cow decided to lick the ice, and it dug out an As, near death from cold, called Buri. He was grandfather to Odin. And Odin’s two brothers, Vili and Ve. 

Who killed Ymir. 

For no reason.

Not that there was anything wrong with doing so! I would never presume to second-guess the Allfather!  
Not while I’m at his small mercies, anyway…

_Anyway_ , Ymir’s corpse somehow managed to make the entirety of the Nine Realms. And sometime in there, the brothers made humans. 

For some reason I doubt that, but you are free to pay me no heed. 

History never tells the story of what truly happened to Vili and Ve after they were no longer important. The Royal Library of Asgard, however, has a hidden tome deep in the recesses of its labyrinthine corridors and hidden crannies, which I shall not name and most certainly did not read, mentioned that they died just before Odin came into power. It seemed suspicious to me at the time. Perhaps Asgard has a fratricide on the throne. 

_I_ should not be surprised if it were true. 

Of course, this is merely one of the few myths I find myself unable to…how should I say it… _elaborate_ upon. Surely one of the next ones will prove more enlightening.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The prisoner finished his last word with a sharp flourish of the pen-tip and reached for a brush, inadvertently knocking over the decorative watercolor inks onto the rest of the paper.  
> So much for another page; his papers are ruined now. The ink will probably soak through all of them.  
> Loki brings his fingers to the bridge of his nose in frustration. 
> 
> That's another few hours of work right there, and it will be another week until he is given more paper to work with. 
> 
> Ah, the perils of writing.


	2. War

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's still not Loki's fault.  
> Yet.  
> Blame the dead guy.

As I still hadn’t yet been brought to Asgard—or born, for that matter—the Aesir and Vanir all had to cope without me.

Cope is a strong term for what they did.

All of you are at least familiar in passing with fair Freya’s job as a deity? I suppose I shall have to presume you are not, in any case. Freya is the goddess of beauty, love, lust, and so on. I must add for the sake of honor, she does not live up to her reputation where it counts. But _that_ , reader, is a different story, and one not meant for now. 

And if I’m to cover Freya, I may as well explain seidr as well. Seidr is the magic of prophecy and the future; I myself am incapable of using it, through no fault of mine own. Basically, it is a thing for women, but that doesn’t much matter, now does it? Just ask Odin. He’ll tell you. And that, I will explain in yet another story. Do be patient.

* * *

In this tale, Freya (under the false name of Heidr, the Bright), a magician talented beyond the abilities of the ungifted Aesir, decided it were her duty to wander the Nine Realms, offering bits and pieces of seidr to the mortals and those without their own, aiding the young and the foolish and the lovestruck and generally being nice—for a price, of course. This was long before she gained her bloodthirsty aspect and began leading men to their deaths, and so she was harmless as a very shapely fly. Or so they thought.

The Aesir wanted that magic. They saw what looked like a helpless woman, practically a child, yet wielding powerful seidr as could make them everything they dreamed of and more. 

I wasn’t there, but I am perfectly aware of what happened next.

Several Aesir warriors stole upon Freya as she was walking along a mountain road, and “gently” maneuvered her from Jotunheim all the way to Asgard. She claimed they used threats and force and the promise of a great deal of compensation for her troubles. I see no reason to doubt this story. 

And as Freya happened upon Asgard, each of the gods was struck by her beauty, her poise, the allure of her seidr and shape. They wanted that power for themselves. Between Odin, Tyr, Balder and Heimdall, practically all of the important Aesir men were vying for her attention and affection, and the women—married and unmarried alike—found themselves suddenly in steep competition. 

‘Heidr’ was very happy to share her attention, her affection, and her powers. As long as she got the right price.

Yep. Even then, the flaxen-haired goddess was enamored with gold. 

But, even if she hadn’t her overwhelming desire for precious metals, Freya was really a foolish girl. Within a month, Odin and Frigga would have been hard-pressed to control the feuding gods even if they weren’t at one another’s throats for her sake as well. Mayhap it was for the better that it took them a long time to realize the cause of their troubles, for when they discovered that the things going out of hand all had one (mostly harmless) root cause, who wasn’t even causing such mayhem on purpose, they immediately resolved to destroy her. 

One day Odin called a meeting of the gods and goddesses, barring Freya, to discuss what had to be done. 

“I say we burn the witch!” Tyr insisted, never one for subtlety or, god forbid, _clever planning_.

(No, I wasn’t there, but give Balder enough alcohol, and he regurgitates whatever horrifying story you have the misfortune to ask him about.)

“I think we should just tell her to go on her way,” Bragi said, ever the peace-keeper. 

“She is a liability and a dangerous enemy,” added Heimdall, “let’s burn her.” 

Frigga, always a voice of reason: “Give that seductress what she deserves.”

And Odin, of course, pitched in with, “That seems an acceptable course of action.”

In case you somehow managed to forget—you’re likely a mortal, I do not know what you are and are not capable of doing!—the witch in question can is _capable of seeing the future_. And so, when it came time to drag Freya to the grand meeting-hall of Asgard, she had already inscribed upon her skin runes of protection from fire. 

They made no ceremony of it, simply throwing the Goddess of Desire into the roaring grate of the All-Father’s fireplace. She screamed and cried and pleaded and banged on the locked doors, and on the other side from where she slowly burned to death the other gods and goddesses drank and ate and held a great feast. And then she died; and then her wards activated, and she rose up out of her own ashes to escape the fireplace. 

For the second time they thrust her back into the fire and shut and locked the grate, which magic had undone. And again she cried and shrieked and begged on bended knee to just be released. And again the gods feasted as this woman burned to death in their meeting hall. And again with her death her spells activated and she was reborn and re-freed. 

And it was only Heimdall’s sharp gaze that caught her as she tried to escape the city through the only door she could find, the Bifrost; so he used his own magic to stun Freya and drag her _back_ to the All-Father’s hall. And I’m certain you know where it went from there. 

Freya again burned, and this time she held her tongue and stared until it was too much to bear, and then she screamed once and fell silent in death. And again she arose. But by now the Aesir had mostly imbued copious quantities of mead and food, and were not paying any particular attention to a slightly sooty serving maid leaving the room. 

Freya wasted no time. With a bowl of water she scried her family and begged _them_ for help, and unlike the Aesir, the Vanir were perfectly willing to have Freya leave Asgard. 

And so began a long conflict. 

The Vanir were righteously angered at this brutal treatment of one of their kin. The Aesir were angered at the loss of their gold. Both sides made demands. Both sides hated each other. 

Both sides decided they were out for blood.

* * *

It took a very long time, and heavy losses from both sides, for either side to finally come to the conclusion that _gee, this war really isn’t getting us anywhere!_. And so, according to tradition and all that, Odin sent his friend Mimir, who gave excellent advice, and Honir, who was a complete idiot, to live with the Vanir; the Aesir got Freya back, with her brother Frey, who was another vain blond with a troublesome appetite for expensive things, and also her father, Njord. I have no _idea_ what the Vanir were thinking, to send Freya back. Then again, I wasn’t there. So we can save the strange plot holes for later, I suppose. 

Njord, Frey and Freya were some very sharp ones, intelligent, witty, generally regarded as beautiful; Honir and Mimir were not. Njord, Frey and Freya tried to make the best of a bad situation; Honir and Mimir did not. Njord, Frey and Freya tried to make themselves compatible with the Aesir; Honir and Mimir tried nothing of the sort. 

Which is why, when the Vanir cut off Mimir’s head and sent Honir back with it, it really came as no surprise.

Have I mentioned that my daughter is literally Death? I shall do so now. My daughter is the custodian of the dead, Hel. And as such I do not appreciate it when people take from them. 

Like Odin.

Odin put a few extremely forbidden spells on Mimir’s severed head—one of which required his eye—in order to preserve it from being dead. Naturally, since Hel wasn’t alive in those times, it wasn’t the absolute worst thing he could have done. However, neither Hel’s predecessor nor Mimir himself was very happy with the arrangement. It was Mimir’s head’s resurrection that, technically, started the events that brought Ragnarok into the realm of possibility.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Loki carefully set down his pen, smirking slightly as he took in the beautiful effect of his delicate runes against the pale gray paper. It had a sense of power, of beingness.  
> Perfect. 
> 
> Oh, but how to go about the next story?
> 
> He tapped on the tabletop as he thought. Because, of course, he was Loki, the table simultaneously froze and caught fire. 
> 
> He spent a couple of panicked moments getting his magic under control,  
> and then putting out the manuscript  
> which also had frozen and  
> it had caught fire and  
> it was  
> it was  
> damaged  
> this was not good  
> loki was not happy  
> it was no longer pleasing to the eye...
> 
> He would have to redo it.  
> It would not do to have such nice paper appear so soiled when finally read.
> 
> Oh, but his hand hurt...
> 
> Such a perilous task, writing.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They killed a magical treaty. And then turned it into a drink. 
> 
> Huh.

As you should know, the Aesir-Vanir war ended in a treaty that literally bound the two realms together. It was, naturally, a binding magical contract; the mages of Vanaheim would not settle for anything less potent or intense. War on such a scale, between the two races, was forever avoided. 

But magic on such a scale, that would bind the entirety of Yggdrasil, required something more than the runes and words and power to flow through. For several days and nights, or so one ancient mage-spirit in Helheim once recounted for me, every mage between the Aesir and Vanir convened and thought for hours, days, _weeks_ until a solution could be found: what could be the vessel of the pact of the Aesir and Vanir?

Finally, they made a breakthrough with their galdr and discovered the secret to the agreement. 

The original Frigga, All-Mother of the Vanir, came before the assembly and grandly announced, in an _utterly reassuring_ and not at _all_ ominous manner, “Before you flee, know that this is intended for the greater good.” Yes, reader. The original diplomat and broker of the peace. It only grew worse. “I shall need to siphon some of the life force of every As and Vanr in this room,” she continued, “including that of myself and the Konungr Seidmenn Odin.”

In a _wholly unforseen_ turn of events, each and every god in the room flew into a panic. 

“You will _not_ have my life!”

“I shall not relinquish my wyrd!”

“What dark nid could you need my _life_ for?!”

Fortunate for the gods of old, the original Odin was a wise and level-headed ruler with a mind for magic. “The All-Mother knows what she is speaking of,” he reassured the horrified Aesir, and the Vanir soon followed suit. “Now, Lady, for what do you need our essences?”

“This treaty is a powerful binding spell,” Frigga explained, “by far too strong for a mere runestone or any kind of galdr at all. The only way to create this spell is for every god and goddess to combine part of their essence in a new being, who would serve as the embodiment of our treaty.”

The All-Mother and her diplomats spent some time focusing on just winning over the Aesir and Vanir factions afraid of the spell, but after a “time longer than long” (the ancient Frigga-spirit’s words, rather than mine own) she and her mages managed to win over the rest of the assembly and began the spell. 

With a very small piece of essence from each god and goddess in attendance—not enough to cause harm, of course—the Vanir volva in charge of the proceedings began her chanting and incantations. For nine days and nine nights she sat outside a rune circle, and in the rune circle there was a great covered pot. And in the pot, the treaty took form. 

On the ninth day, she uncovered the pot. 

In the pot there was a little figure. A mortal man, who through magic had his life extended for all the time that the treaty lasted, and not a minute more. They called him Kvasir.  
Kvasir was a wise and clever mortal. The wisest mortal in all the worlds, or so the tales claim; I may not believe so, but I was not there. In any case, Kvasir was beloved of the gods, jotnar, men and elves and all those besides. 

Yet in any world there is envy; a moon for every sun, a corruption to match every pure heart. And so it was, and is, and so it will be. Jealousy drives misfortune, and death follows in its path like the foul birds that perched on Odin’s throne. 

It came to pass that, like Freya had all those years ago, Kvasir the ‘wise’ traveled the Nine Realms (with the aid of the gods of course; I was the first and only Sky Walker), and dispensed his wisdom to the people of every realm. Never once was he cruel or did he turn away a single soul in need of counsel. Nor did he ever anger or harm a single sentient being. 

But alas, two dark-elves, by the names of Fjalar and Galar, invited him to their little home in the depths of the mines of Nidavellir one day. The two were a dark pair, delighting in spilling blood and crushing bone and sowing misery and fear. (Not far from the glorious Aesir, insofar as I have seen.)

Kvasir came, expecting a challenging question. 

What he recieved instead was a well-honed blade to the throat. 

Galar was the one who came up with the _refined_ and _elegant_ idea of bleeding Kvasir’s corpse dry over a bucket and brewing mead with it. Delicious. Last I checked, mortal blood is viciously salty and bitter, quite unlike elvish blood, and so it happens that these dark-elves never drank the oversalted mead, but stored it in a thick barrel in their cellar, to age or rot or otherwise be out of their hair. 

Meanwhile, the two criminally insane elves were tracked down by two gods--Tyr and Frey. 

“Where is Kvasir?” Frey demanded, while Tyr leveled his sword at the two elves menacingly. 

“Well,” Fjalar stalled, “he came here to help us with an issue in our forges…” while Galar frantically thought. 

“…and then he told us that the right forge wasn’t working because we had the wrong sort of coal, and, then—”

“We invited him in for a drink,” Galar cut in, “but he choked on his wisdom. He said he was going to see someone else about it.”  
I don’t know _precisely_ what happened after that, but Frey and Tyr took the elves’ words at face value and left.

A month or so later, the vicious pair found an eldjotnar, a fire giant if you will, by the name of Gilling. Gilling was a craftsman in his own right, living in Svartalfheim with his wife and son to have easier access to the wild magic of that particular realm. He was wholly and completely benign, not even selling his works on Svartalfheim or its’ respective markets but instead taking them back home and distributing it amongst his own kin and kith. I am spelling this out for you, reader. There was no provocation whatsoever.

Galar asked him to row him into the middle of a lake in order to “gather some metals from the lake bed,” and, while they were out there, threw Gilling over the side and held him under water until he had drowned. 

Fjalar, the worse of the two, let the family’s grieving be for a while, yet decided eventually that he was sick and tired of hearing the felled giant’s wife weeping. He dropped a millstone on her head, crushing her skull to pieces, and left her in front of her home. But he forgot about their son, Suttung, who happened to be a vindictive drunkard. When he realized that his family was dead at Fjalar and Galar’s bloodstained hands, he vowed revenge.

He commissioned the pair to build an arch across his door and engrave it with his parents’ names in runes. The dark elves, seeing this as a beautiful opportunity to end another life, happily agreed. But when they arrived at Suttung’s domicile, the eldjotun caught them both in a net and dragged them to the shores of the ocean. There he tied them to a flat rock, where once the tide came in they would drown. 

“Mercy, please!” Galar cried.

“Yes, please, please let us free!” pleaded Fjalar tearfully.

“Did you show my mother mercy?” Suttung grinned toothily, and tightened Fjalar’s restraints to the point that the evil dark elf’s wrists were close to breaking. “I heard you have something, which I rather want. Is it true that you killed the wise mortal and made mead from his life-blood?”

“Yes!” Galar screamed, “please, just let us go, we’ll give it all to you, just don’t kill us!”

“Where is it?”

But Fjalar was a craftier fellow than his brother, and said, “Release us and we will bring it to you.”

* * *

Eventually, with a bit of cajoling, the two dark elves convinced Suttung to let them go after he’d gotten the mead. He took the barrels into a mountain and had his daughter, Gunnlod, watch over it. Then he turned his back, let them off their restraints, and—chanted a bit of galdr to kill the dwarves, and threw their carcasses into the ocean. It was only fitting, in any case. 

After a sip of the mead, foul-tasting as it was, it became incredibly clear that the alcohol had strange magical properties. Gunnlod, after her first cup, declared it to be “mead of poetry,” a name incredibly accurate. Any who drank of that particular drink would find themselves a poet or scholar, imparted with some of Kvasir’s wisdom.

In Asgard, Odin fumed. Odin was relentless in both his own search for knowledge and his desire to keep wisdom out of the hands of the masses. For any story is _true_ , so long as it is _believed_. At least, that is how I see it. That is how he _taught_ me to see it. 

In any case, the fact that this mead of poetry was in the hands of not only a part of the general populace, but that of a Jotun, infuriated Odin to no end. He schemed and he plotted, he stewed and he fumed, and he devoted his hours to _getting his hands on that mead_.

* * *

Exactly eighteen days after Suttung got his hands on the mead of poetry, Odin disguised himself as a wandering farmhand and set out to Suttung’s brother Baugi’s farm. There he found nine servants, cutting hay with dull scythes. 

“Do you need help, friends?” Odin asked. 

“Ah, not right now,” the first of the servants said. “Perhaps in a few weeks, maybe there will be a job for you, but today our master hasn’t the money to pay us all and you.”

“I simply wish to help you,” Odin said. “I see that your scythes are rather dull; I have in my possession the greatest whetstone in the world. Would you allow me to sharpen your scythes?”

“Sure,” said a second servant. “As long as you don’t expect us to pay you for it. You offered.”

“All right, then,” Odin said. “May I have your scythes?”

The servants all handed over their scythes, and Odin sharpened them to a razor point with some quick spellcraft. Yes, reader. Odin is a sorcerer, just like me. And what’s more, _he practices seidr_. And yet people mock me for being erg, and not him. But I digress. 

“This must be the finest whetstone in the world!” marveled the first servant after he got his scythe back. “It cuts the hay like a heated blade through butter!” The other servants were quick to agree. 

“I know we are poor and have little money,” a third servant said slyly, “but surely you must be tired having to carry that stone around. Let us give you some gold and take the burden off of our hands.”

“I would, friends, but the stone is worth a high price. And it is magic, it can only belong to one person at a time. Still, you are right; it is heavy and a burden besides. Here,” he threw the stone high into the air, “he who catches it can have it, I suppose.”

In a mad scramble, the nine farmhands dashed for the whetstone, scythes swinging wildly as they all darted for the spot. Odin’s spellwork did its’ true job, and each of the blades found themselves sheathed in flesh belonging to the farmhands. Nine there were blades; and nine corpses to slake Odin’s fury for now. 

But the job was not over; Odin still had more to do. 

He marched up to Baugi’s door. He knocked.

“Hello, good sir,” he said politely. “I am called Bolverkr, and I came upon an awful scene in your fields today as I was walking. Your nine farmhands were lying dead in the center of a field! They had obviously killed each other. Probably over a foolish and base argument, if I may say so myself, sir. I promise I can do all of their work and more, and finish the growing season for you well enough. And cheaply, too.”

“Huh. Well. Name your price, Bolverkr,” Baugi said. “We’ll see if it is a worthy match to your abilities.”  
“I heard a story about your brother, Suttung. He has, it was said, a marvelous mead that makes people wise beyond their wildest dreams. I wish for but a sip.”

“Um. I apologize, but as you said, the mead belongs to my brother. Not me. I’ll put in a good word for you, of course; but I do not make any promises I cannot keep. My brother guards his magic mead jealously.”

“I see,” said Odin, and turned as though to walk away—

“But! If you really can do all the work of nine men, I’ll do whatever I can!” Baugi was frantic. 

“All right!” Odin agreed. “So, I’ll get started, then.”

A few months passed, and the growing season came to an end. Baugi was impressed beyond words by Odin’s performance, and he agreed readily to take his ‘farmhand’ to meet his brother and beg for a sip of the mead. 

To put it shortly, Suttung refused. 

At this point, Odin was getting extremely angry. “Baugi, remember your oath,” he said, and brought the giant up the mountain. Drawing out a stone-mason’s drill, he bade the farmer to put a hole through the ground to Suttung’s daughter’s home.

For a while Baugi toiled. “I’m finished,” he finally announced. Odin drew back and tried to blow the rock-dust through the hole, but instead it blew back in his face.

“This hole is incomplete,” he said. “Are you so dishonorable?” 

“No,” Baugi muttered. “Give me that auger back.” And he returned to his drilling.

Once more, Baugi sat back. “I’m finished with this,” he muttered. Odin once again blew into the hole, but this time it was truly finished. He thanked Baugi for his work, and transformed suddenly into a snake. Baugi jumped backwards, spitting curses. Finally he got his wits about him and took the augur, swiftly plunging it into the hole he’d just cut; 

Odin just barely escaped the wickedly curved drill-tip. 

 

Then he was in Gunnlod’s private chambers, and he transformed himself into a charming young man. He sought out the young giantess, a lonely but beautiful girl wishing for naught but company, and charmed her with a few kind words and a smile. They came to an arrangement.

For three days, Odin stayed with her in her chambers, pleasing her nightly, and at the end of the nights she told him that he could have three sips of the mead. But Odin ever was a crafty man, and so he used his magic to drain each barrel as he took his three ‘small’ sips. He bid Suttung’s daughter goodbye, and flew off in the form of an eagle.  
Suttung, once he saw the eagle, immediately realized what had happened and transformed himself into a falcon, so as to give chase. Furious, he chased Odin nearly the whole way to Asgard, where the king of the gods magicked the mead from himself to several barrelsset along the Bifrost, and then landed and turned to his As form once more. In shock, Suttung realized that he had chased the king of the gods from his home and that he had been—he had been _cheated_ by the king of Asgard! Realizing this was a battle he could not win, he turned and tried to escape. Alas, but it was not to be. 

 

Heimdall saw the bird for Suttung. He pointed it to Tyr, who told Frey, who took his magic sword and let loose a massive blast that shot the jotun out of the sky and killed him.

* * *

And thus, the end of the tale is nigh. Yet, the barrels leaked as they were rolled from the rainbow bridge and into Asgard proper. The drops of liquid scattered throughout the Nine Realms, endowing poetry and wisdom upon all that they touched, and in their bloodline as well. And so poetry, once a hard-to-create masterpiece written only by those Odin chose to gift with the mead, now is a common thing in all the realms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Loki set down his pen with a delicate flick of his wrist.  
> This chapter was twice the length of the last one, he realized with a jolt. 
> 
> Perhaps he was getting better at this whole 'writing' business.
> 
>  
> 
> "Loki, my dear!" Sigyn whined behind him. "What are you doing? Pay attention to _me_! For god's sake, we're married! Frigga and Freya themselves matched us up! You're supposed to treat me as though I'm the center of your world! Like Thor and his woman!"  
>  _Like Thor and Sif? No, I don't think that's what she wants. He spends more time with her namesake, the raven=-haired warrior Sif, than that fat blonde cow, anyway._
> 
> "Sigyn _dear_ , Thor is a worse husband than I could ever be. What _ever_ are you talking about?"
> 
> "Oh, not Thor and his _wife_!" she scoffed, as though that had been obvious from the beginning. "Thor and his mortal woman."
> 
>  
> 
> _WHAT?_
> 
>  
> 
> "If you really want to make yourself useful," Loki drawled, organizing his papers, "take these around the city and get people's opinions; I wish for feedback."
> 
> Sigyn grinned brightly. "I will do that, husband dear. Oh, and that disgusting Angrboda woman came by yesterday; she said she has something to talk to you about. We should be seeing her in here with you sometime. Perhaps your cells will be nearby, hmm?" She flashed one last, sharp-toothed grin, and finally left.
> 
> Loki suppressed the urge to shudder. Sigyn was, at times, a horrifically vindictive woman. She had _killed_ her own _son_ when she found out that Loki had cheated on her. As if he didn't know what she and Frey had been doing. 
> 
> He hoped she hadn't tried to, I don't know, _burn Angi to death_ like she'd threatened once. Freya was a HORRIBLE matchmaker. 
> 
> He turned back to his papers and began to write the next page, but his hands were shaking so hard that he splashed ink across the papers again.  
> Again.  
> It appeared he had made a habit of spilling ink on his papers. Yet, he was too unsettled to magic it away, and so the ink stain stayed.
> 
> Oh, the perils of marriage.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Asgard's new king kills small children in his spare time. 
> 
> Also, a rare Loki is spotted in the wild!

At some point between the debacle with the Alcoholic Beverages of Intellectuality, or shall I say the Mead of Poetry, Odin and Frigga finally got over their collective prudishness and, well, Thor happened. And although Sigyn revealed to me that you all want _details_ , the only word is _NO_. First of all, he’s my king, and secondly, he’s my dad. Thirdly, I’m in his jail cell, but should that not be already known to all? 

This is a tale every child knows on Asgard, but as I saw on my ill-fated ‘attempt’ to conquer Midgard, it is practically a non-event. Let me clear some confusion. I know not much of what happened in this tale, either. But soon, you _shall_ be getting details. Because I, your humble narrator, have a startlingly good memory. Still, I shall attempt to make this…fun.

* * *

About two thousand, six hundred and ninety eight years ago, the king of Jotunheim, Laufey, married an eldjotun princess of Muspellheim by the name of Farbauti in a pact that effectively allied their realms permanently. Laufey and Farbauti gained several heirs. By the time that Jotunheim was hit by an extreme volcanic ice age, their first was about six hundred years old. A child, for all intents and purposes. His siblings were all younger than him. None save he could even swing a sword or geld an incantation, let alone pose a threat. 

I am absolutely certain you know what happens next, reader. Jotunheim was dying. Volcanic eruptions devastated the planet as the energies surrounding its core were overloaded by the magnetism of the Yggdrasil's balance being thrown out, leading to an ash-induced ice age. Ice covered the once-fertile fields, the renowned Ironwood Forest was buried under hundreds of feet of snow and ash, and three quarters of the population had frozen, burned to death or been trapped in the harsh new elements long enough to die of exposure or injuries. The old and the young were most affected; even now, frozen bodies in near-perfect preservation can be found near the old capital city. Those with the powers of ice were mostly unaffected, but the wind giants? The water giants? They were nearing extinction. 

You cannot understand, reader. As a child I was often captivated by the thought of a frozen city, and once I learned to skywalk Jotunheim was the first place I went. Can you imagine my horror, when seven steps in I found a fully-preserved body, scarcely older than myself, lying dead on the ground with its mouth twisted in a sickly smile and torso half-crushed by an enormous chunk of ash-dirtied ice? I imagine you cannot. It was my first experience with death, and gory as it was it was a jarring one. But this tale, reader, is not about me yet. And so I must continue. 

There was, at that time, a strange magical current (a pulsating magicomagnetic imbalance, in truth) ravaging its way along the whole of the Yggdrasil in which travel by conventional magical means was nigh on impossible, energetic interference rendering nearly all portals horrifically inaccurate. Even knowing this, Laufey sent nearly his entire army and as many refugees as he could to what he thought might be Muspellheim in order to ask for aid, or resettlement. 

Can you guess, reader dear, where they ended up?

Yes, I imagine you can.

Midgard. 

What looked to the starving and heartsick Jotnar army a gift from the Norns was instead the experimental baby of Asgard, a protectorate for something the Allfather wanted to keep secret. Knowing the convergence would be over relatively soon, and that soon Laufey and Farbauti could send the civilians to start a new life on Earth, the army set up a large base and began testing the waters (as it were) to find out how to survive on this new, strange, planet. 

Unfortunately for them, a small Asgardian regiment was stationed at all times on the planet. The second that the convergence was over, Asgard got an urgent notification that “the filthy Jotnar are invading Midgard!”

An army was launched. Of course.

* * *

The young Odin XVII, who had been coronated only three hundred years prior and commanding his first true army, slashed at the armor of a scrawny jotun warrior. The man—though boy would be more accurate, for he could not be over one thousand—screamed as the blade split his flesh. “I surrender!” Another swing, and he took off the enemy soldier’s head with a spray of blood; Bor, his father, cautioned him against leaving enemies alive. 

Another came from behind and slammed the tip of a glaive into the back of the king’s armor, with some fortune, for good or ill, guiding it to scrape the metal rather than pierce it. Odin turned with a shout, eviscerating the jotun wielding the weapon, and then fended off a sword blow with his own blade. At this point the king was already drenched in blood, his armor scraped and his blade newly nicked along the shimmering silver edge and caught with gore and blood until it looked deep brown, near black, as the enemies piled up. 

“To me!” he cried, lifting that same ruined sword in the air as a beacon to the flagging warriors. “We shall have our victory on this day!”

At that point an arrow thudded dully against his wrist, the one lifting his sword, and he nearly dropped the weapon in shock and pain. It wasn’t that the projectile had even punctured the double layered protection of his vambrace and gauntlet, so much as it surprised him. _Such dishonorable creatures these must be!_ , the All-Father thought in shock. _To attack a commander? Who would do such a thing?_

At any rate, the Asgardian army and the Jotun army then clashed again, washing away the memory in a tide of blood and guts and gore and bodies. Slash. Hack. It faded into a kind of rhythm, after a while. 

That was before Laufey’s son managed to put out his eye.

Almost all Jotnar can warp ice and weave it to some small degree, but it was no small surprise that Laufey and Farbauti’s offspring were exceptional. Kalavedr, the eldest, was able to freeze the entire left side of the All-Father’s helmet before he managed to throw it off and to the side. 

_Targeting the leader again! Have these creatures no shame?_ the young man screamed inside his head, blood dripping from the wounded eye socket—hot against the empty frigidity of the shards of ice still buried in the ball of ruined tissue in his skull, moving unheeded down his face as the king raised a great cry of anger and strode forwards, felling those in his path with all the speed he could muster, even if his skill was somewhat diminished by the fact that he now had an enormous blind spot. 

Yet, with superior forces and numbers, the Asgardians triumphed and the king and his own were captured, prisoner to the All-Father and his forces.

Many wounds to the head did the All-Father gain that day, but only one would last him his lifetime, and that was the blow to his vision. Odin was seeing red, literally and figuratively. And, like many might have done of me, he had no idea that the man he was cursing was naught but a child doing as he felt right.

But an oath must be upheld. The wound must be repaid tenfold. 

That was what he told himself as he skewered Laufey’s firstborn through the eye. 

That was what he told himself as he threw their second’s bloodied body down without her head. 

And so on. And so. 

But even a cruel, furious man is not free from the ever crueller, ever more furious bite of guilt. And so when the seventh son of Laufey was found, a tiny newborn lying near-dead in a temple where he had been hidden with the greatest treasure the Jotnar had ever known, though his lineage was clear on his skin, the All-Father could not bear to bring himself to kill it. 

Selfishness, disguised as cruelty hidden with false kindness and plotting. 

Never let it be said that the All-Father is not as wily and sly as I, when he can weave falsehood in falsehood in falsehood as even I have difficulty doing. 

I digress. This is rather not the tangent I intended to take, whatsoever. So please, reader, do ignore me. I haven’t anything to remove the ink that shall not be undone once it leaves my cell; I now know better than to try. Where was I?

Yes. And so I must assume that as you _are_ in fact, reading this, you have rather enough information to determine the current identity of that long lost child stolen from its home. 

If you thought it was me, well. Congratulations. Go fetch yourself a cookie, or whatever it is that you Midgardians say at times such as these. You would be correct in every sense of the word. As was my displeasure to discover…but that, reader, is for another time and another tale.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Loki finally finishes writing the last word, sighing at how short the tale came to be.  
> It had...it had seemed longer as he struggled to put the words to the page. But then, a skald's greatest curse is that of phrasing, and it has always been in such a way that the mortals even have a phrase for it. Block of the writer, Loki is sure of it. 
> 
> "Angrboða!" Loki yells across the ever-shimmering barrier separating him from the hallway. The tall, elegantly pale blue woman three cells down and one across looks at him, back at the floor she's been scratching at for the past four and a half hours, and gets up with a sigh.
> 
> "Ugh. Loki, what is it? Can you not see I am busy?"
> 
> Loki sighs. Ever since she had been jailed, she used Loki as a convenient excuse for her imprisonment. 
> 
> He couldn't blame her, not exactly. For the first couple of years, he had blamed Them. The mortals that had cooperated so beautifully--except when it came to letting Loki explain himself. Because, of course, no one can trust a liar. But that is not important.
> 
> "Angi, I wrote something. Would you read it? I would like to know what people think."
> 
> Angerboða gives him a curious stare. "And I would do that for _you_ because...?"
> 
> "Because you are bored, and because it might please you to read the tale of your true captor's blinding. And, because whatever my faults, I am still a talented wordsmith, or so you may remember?"
> 
> "I remember all too well, _liesmith_ ," she spits venomously, turning Loki's already-unpleasant epithet into a curse befitting the name of the one who Loki shall not name. He sighs, for though he may have seen it coming, he stil did not wish to believe it. Turning inwards once more, the disinherited prince gathers his papers and sets them gently on the shelf in a place just behind the last chapter. 
> 
> _I really must find someone willing to read this_ , Loki muses. _How am I to know what it is I ought to do if I cannot have any sort of feedback? For all my talent, I have never envied a skald before, and I never attempted anything of this sort._


End file.
